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The online tax return system could not attract the large individual taxpayers due to a lack of confidence in the portal having inadequate features.
The full features that could have gained confidence of the high-income group of people in getting relief from further scrutiny are yet to be launched, taxpayers have pointed out.
They said the online portal has no options to upload documents, discouraging the large taxpayers - most of them have multiple sources of income.
However, the tax officials said the large taxpayers, including sponsor directors of banks and different companies are yet to be sensitised to submit their tax returns online on their own as majority of them depend on tax lawyers.
Currently, the online tax return submission facility is only available for the individual taxpayers.
A marginal number of taxpayers have availed the facility until the January 31, 2024 deadline, filing 518,000 returns as compared to 244,481 last year.
A large taxpayer, preferring anonymity, said the online tax return portal is not yet fully capable to attract taxpayers to utilise it with full confidence.
The site, known as e-return, has no option to upload necessary documents with the tax returns, he added.
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) launched the upgraded tax return submission portal aligning with the new income tax law in October last year to encourage the taxpayers to file returns through the site.
The portal offered an extended facility this year, allowing all the taxpayers to file returns online and obtain the Proof of Submission of Returns (PSR) without visiting the tax offices.
However, the NBR is yet to establish full interconnectivity with the tax-deducting authorities.
Integration with the other source tax-deducting authorities to develop the portal's tax calculation system by adjusting source taxes is a vital part in the online system, officials said.
Almost 99 per cent of the taxpayers have been paying source taxes in different entities due to expansion of withholding tax net, they added.
The large taxpayers have found it as one of the major flaws to submit online returns.
From July 1, 2023 to January 31, 2024, some 531 individuals and 278 companies have submitted their tax returns manually under the large taxpayers unit (LTU) of the income tax wing.
Some 273 companies and 472 individuals have filed tax returns under LTU during this period. However, the number of tax return submissions by large individual taxpayers was 59 and only five companies under the Chattogram LTU.
January 31, 2024 was the last day of tax return submission by all individual taxpayers.
By then, large individual taxpayers paid Tk 1.62 billion in taxes with the tax returns.
The large companies including banks, non-banking financial institutions, and telecom companies paid Tk 15.96 billion with tax returns until January 31, 2024.
However, there is no campaign and training to popularise the online return submission system to encourage the taxpayers.
Currently, some 3.5 individual taxpayers submit tax returns.